People who have been taught that cow's milk is the "perfect food" may be
shocked to hear many prominent medical doctors are now saying dairy consumption is a
contributing factor in nearly two dozen diseases of children and adults.

In American society, one of the most sacred of all sacred cows is the milk of the
cow itself. Cow's milk is more American than apple pie, but that's because apple pie
doesn't have Congressional lobbyists and a multi-million dollar advertising budget. Most
parents wouldn't think of raising their children without the benefit of cow's milk to help
their little bones to grow big and strong. Its silky, white texture is the very epitome of
our concept of wholesome purity.

Our "nutritional education" in school (funded in part by the dairy
industry) taught us that dairy products are one of the four basic food groups we all need
for proper nutrition. And with more than 60 of the most powerful Congressional leaders in
Washington receiving campaign contributions from the National Dairy Council, we can be
assured that dairy products are well-entrenched as a major staple of our
government-sponsored school lunch programs.

Cow's milk is promoted as the "perfect food" for humans, and especially
for our children. This advertising has put such a strong emphasis on the health of our
children that some people view milk commercials as more of a public service announcement
than an attempt to sell a product. These ads have told us "Milk is a Natural,"
"Everybody Needs Milk," "Milk is the Perfect Food," etc. This
advertising has served its purpose well because the average American consumes 375 pounds
of dairy products a year. One out of every seven dollars spent on groceries in the U.S.
goes to buy dairy products.

But to gauge the full impact of this promotion, we must consider more than just
the dollar amount spent on dairy products. We must also consider the impact this massive
advertising, promotion, lobbying, "nutritional education" and public relations
effort has had by creating a widely-held perception of cow's milk as a very wholesome and
healthy product. This promotion has been so effective that it is common for even people
who give up meat to still feel that they should continue consuming dairy products to
ensure they receive sufficient protein or calcium. People buy cow's milk for their
families based on the premise that this product provides essential nutrition, helps to
build a healthy body, and that indeed, their precious health may be in jeopardy if they do
not drink milk. If this is the premise on which Americans spend an incredible chunk of
their grocery bill to provide for the health and nutrition of their loved ones, we need to
further examine this premise. Despite what the dairy industry has led us to believe, many
medical doctors and nutritionists are now saying that cow's milk is not healthy for human
consumption, and that it can lead to many serious diseases. When you look at the
credentials of the doctors making these statements, it would be hard for the dairy
industry to accuse these physicians of being on the lunatic fringe of the medical world.

Frank Oski, M.D., author of Don't Drink Your Milk! is the Director of the
Department of Pediatrics of Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and
Physician-in-Chief of the Johns Hopkins Children's Center. He is the author, co-author,
editor or co-editor of 19 medical textbooks and has written 290 medical manuscripts.

In the first chapter of his book, Dr. Oski states, "The fact is: the drinking
of cow milk has been linked to iron-deficiency anemia in infants and children; it has been
named as the cause of cramps and diarrhea in much of the world's population, and the cause
of multiple forms of allergy as well; and the possibility has been raised that it may play
a central role in the origins of atherosclerosis and heart attacks." Dr. Oski
comments, "Being against cow milk is equated with being un-American," but still
he notes, "Among physicians, so much concern has been voiced about the potential
hazards of cow milk that the Committee on Nutrition of the prestigious American Academy of
Pediatrics, the institutional voice of practicing pediatricians, released a report
entitled, 'Should Milk Drinking by Children Be Discouraged?' Although the Academy's answer
to this question has (as of this writing) been a qualified 'maybe,' the fact that the
question was raised at all is testimony to the growing concern about this product, which
for so long was viewed as sacred as the proverbial goodness of mother and apple pie."

Another outspoken critic of cow's milk is Dr. William Ellis, a retired osteopathic
physician and surgeon in Arlington, Texas, who has researched the effects of dairy
products for 42 years. Dr. Ellis is listed in Marquis' Who's Who in the East, Leaders of
American Science, the Dictionary of International Biography and Two Thousand Men of
Achievement. Dr. Ellis says dairy products are "simply no good for humans... There is
overwhelming evidence that milk and milk products are harmful to many people, both adults
and infants. Milk is a contributing factor in constipation, chronic fatigue, arthritis,
headaches, muscle cramps, obesity, allergies and heart problems." When Washington
D.C.-based pediatrician Dr. Russell Bunai was asked what single change in the American
diet would produce the greatest health benefit, his answer was, "Eliminating dairy
products." Dr. Christiane Northrup, a gynecologist in Yarmouth, Maine, states,
"Dairy is a tremendous mucus producer and a burden on the respiratory, digestive and
immune systems." Dr. Northrup says when patients "eliminate dairy products for
an extended period and eat a balanced diet, they suffer less from colds and sinus
infections."

Dr. Oski's book includes a letter written by Dr. J. Dan Baggett, a pediatrician in
Alabama who describes his experience after six years of recommending that all his patients
eliminate cow's milk from their diets. He writes, "In general, they cooperate much
better than I had earlier anticipated except for the pre-teenagers and teenagers."
Dr. Baggett's letter, states in part:

"During the years 1963 through 1967, I referred an average of four
appendectomy cases per year. During the past five and a half years, I have referred only
two patients for appendectomy, the last one being three years ago. Both of these children
were professed milk guzzlers. "I do not have a single patient with active asthma. In
fact, I have nearly forgotten how to prescribe for them.

"Perhaps the most significant thing I have learned is that Group A
beta-hemolytic streptococcus germ will not, under ordinary circumstances, establish an
infection in a child kept on an absolutely no-milk-protein dietary regimen. I have been
aware of this for the past two and a half years and, so far, there have been no
exceptions. Any time a patient of mine is found to have streptococcal pharyngitis or
pyoderma, we can establish by history that he has ingested milk protein within five days
prior to onset of symptoms or signs bringing him to the office. "I now admit an
average of 12-14 patients per year to the hospital. Their average hospital stay is three
days. Between 1963 and 1967, I admitted an average of 100+ patients to the hospital per
year. Their average stay was five days."

So how can all these medical statements be explained in light of what we have been
taught all of our life about milk? Remember "Milk is the Perfect Food"...
"Milk is a Natural"... "Everybody Needs Milk." Are we talking about
the same food here? Perhaps we are not. It would appear that promoters of cow's milk are
creating advertising statements that are meant to appeal on a subconscious level to our
positive feelings and experiences with human breast milk. All mammals, including humans,
are intended to be nourished during infancy by milk from their mother. Part of the very
definition of a mammal is that the female of the species has milk-producing glands in her
breasts which provide nourishment for her young. Each species of mammal produces its
unique type of milk designed specifically to strengthen the immune system and provide
nourishment for their babies, which are weaned after their birth weight has approximately
tripled.

So, absolutely yes, "milk is a natural"... in the proper context. It is
perfectly natural for infant mammals, including humans, to be nourished exclusively by
milk from their mother's breasts. So if we are talking about human breast milk for babies,
yes, "milk is the perfect food." And yes, during infancy when we have no teeth
for eating solid food, and as we need to strengthen our immune system, "everybody
needs milk." I have just quoted three of the most popular advertising slogans of the
dairy industry and they are undisputably as true as any words that could be spoken on the
subject of nutrition... if they are applied to a baby's need for human breast milk. In
fact, not one of the doctors I have quoted in describing the terrible problems caused by
cow's milk would disagree that milk is a natural, milk is the perfect food or that
everybody needs milk, in this context. But whoa. The dairy industry has begun with these
three statements that we all know are true about a baby's need for human breast milk, and
twisted them out of context to apply them to a completely different product they are
selling. And the sad result is that most Americans still think these noble statements
about our babies needing to suckle their mother's breast milk are true when applied to the
advertising claim that humans of all ages need to buy and drink cow's milk. So, in an
effort to undo the damage caused by this manipulation, let us consider the differences in
human breast milk versus cow's milk, and further examine the physical problems caused by
humans trying to subsist on the milk of another species well past the age when any mammal
should be drinking any milk.

A good place to start in analyzing the distinction between milk of different
species is to begin to understand how nature works. As Dr. Oski explains in Don't Drink
Your Milk!, "The milk of each species appears to have been specifically designed to
protect the young of that species. Cross-feeding does not work. Heating, sterilization, or
modification of the milk in any way destroys the protection." So, how much of a
difference is there between a human baby drinking the milk of its mother versus drinking
the milk of a cow? Dr. Oski cites a "study of over twenty thousand infants conducted
in Chicago as far back as the 1930s... The overall death rate for the babies raised on
human milk was 1.5 deaths per 1,000 infants while the death rate in the babies fed cow
milk was 84.7 per 1,000 during the first nine months of life. The death rate from
gastrointestinal infections was forty times higher in the non-breast-fed infants, while
the death rate from respiratory infections was 120 times higher. An earlier analysis
involving infants in eight American cities showed similar results. Infants fed on cow milk
had a twenty times greater chance of dying during the first six months of life."

Dr. Michael Taylor, a Chiropractic Physician, doctoral candidate to become a
Doctor of Nutrition and fellow of the American Academy of Orthomolecular Medicine, agrees,
stating, "It is a dietary error to cross species to get milk from another
animal." He notes there is a tremendous difference between human babies and baby
calves, and a corresponding difference between the milk that is intended to nourish human
babies and baby calves. In an interview on "Let's Eat," a Seventh-day Adventist
television program, Dr. Taylor notes that human infants take about 180 days to double
their birth weight, and that human milk is 5 to 7 percent protein. Calves require only 45
days to double their birth weight and cow's milk is 15 percent protein. In addition to the
difference in the amount of protein in these two different types of milk, there are also
major differences in the composition of this protein. The primary type of protein in cow's
milk is casein. Cow's milk has 20 times as much casein as human milk, which makes the
protein from cow's milk difficult or impossible for humans to assimilate, according to Dr.
John R. Christopher, N.D., M.H. Protein composes 15 percent of the human body and when
this protein cannot be properly broken down, it weakens the immune system, causing
allergies and many other problems. Allergies caused by cow's milk are extremely common. In
fact, Dr. Taylor states that when a single food can be isolated as the cause of an
allergy, 60 percent of the time, that food is cow's milk. Dr. Ellis notes that symptoms of
this allergic reaction to cow's milk in infants can include asthma, nasal congestion, skin
rash, chest infections, irritability and fatigue. Dr. Oski's book cites evidence from Dr.
Joyce Gryboski, director of the Pediatric Gastrointestinal Clinic at Yale University
School of Medicine, who states "they see at least one child a week who is referred
for evaluation of chronic diarrhea and proves to have nothing more than an allergy to cow
milk."

Another reason many people suffer various symptoms of disease from drinking milk
is that, according to Dr. Oski, the majority of the world's adult population is
"lactose intolerant," meaning they cannot digest lactose, the sugar in milk
(cow's milk and human milk). An enzyme known as lactase is required to digest lactose, and
Dr. Oski states that "between the age of one and a half and four years most
individuals gradually lose the lactase activity in their small intestine. This appears to
be a normal process that accompanies maturation.... Most people do it. All animals do it.
It reflects the fact that nature never intended lactose-containing foods, such as milk, to
be consumed after the normal weaning period."

In fact, so many people have bad reactions to drinking cow's milk that in 1974 the
Federal Trade Commission felt compelled to take legal action against advertising claims
made by the California Milk Producers. The ads claimed "Everybody Needs Milk."
The FTC prosecuted the milk producers for "false, misleading and deceptive"
advertising. The FTC complaint cited the high incidence of lactose intolerance, allergies
caused by cow's milk and the increased risk of heart disease. The FTC won and the milk
producers had to come up with a new slogan for their ads: "Milk Has Something for
Everybody." One medical researcher, Dr. Kevin McGrady, commented, "Milk has
something for everybody all right -- higher blood cholesterol, and increased risk of heart
disease and stroke." Three reasons cited by medical researchers that dairy products
contribute to heart disease are their high content of cholesterol and fat, along with an
enzyme in cow's milk called xanthine oxidase (XO). This enzyme, which creates problems
only when milk is homogenized, causes heart disease by damaging arteries. Explaining the
significance of XO, Dr. Ellis cites research by Dr. Kurt Oster, Chief of Cardiology at
Park City Hospital in Bridgeport, Connecticut: "From 1971 to 1974, we studied 75
patients with angina pectoris (chest pain due to heart disease) and arteriosclerosis
(hardening of the arteries). All the patients were taken off milk and given folic acid (a
B-vitamin) and ascorbic acid (vitamin C), both of which combat the action of XO. The
results were dramatic. Chest pains decreased, symptoms lessened, and each of those
patients is doing great today." Dr. Oster's article states that Dr. Kurt Esselbacher,
Chairman of the Department of the Harvard Medical School, was in full agreement. Dr.
Esselbacher writes: "Homogenized milk, because of its XO content, is one of the major
causes of heart disease in the U.S."

Dr. Oski warns, "The consumption of cow milk from an early age may have
life-long consequences... One pathologist has reviewed the heart vessels of over 1,500
children and adolescents who had died as a result of accidents.... These children and
adolescents had not died as a result of disease, yet many of them showed signs of diseased
arteries in the heart.... The majority of children with normal blood vessels had been
breast-fed; the majority of children with diseased vessels had been fed cow milk or cow
milk based formulas. It is therefore reasonable to conclude that the differences between
human milk and cow milk were responsible for the early changes in the coronary
arteries." But don't we need to drink milk to get calcium? No. The best way to add
calcium to your diet is to eat more fresh green vegetables. Cow's milk is high in calcium,
but Dr. Ellis explains, the problem is that it is in a form that cannot be assimilated
very well by humans. Dr. Ellis states, "Thousands and thousands of blood tests I've
conducted show that people who drink 3 or 4 glasses of milk a day invariably had the
lowest levels of blood calcium." Dr. Ellis adds, "Low levels of blood calcium
correspond with irritability and headaches. In addition, the low calcium level in
milk-drinkers also explains why milk-drinkers are prone to have muscle spasms and cramps.
Since calcium is necessary for muscles to relax, a lack of calcium causes muscle cramps,
etc."

One of the most serious problems caused by a calcium deficiency is osteoporosis, a
condition characterized by the loss of 50 to 75 percent of the person's original bone
material. In the U.S., 25 percent of 65-year-old women suffer from osteoporosis. Their
bones become brittle and easily broken. They can crack a rib from something as minor as a
sneeze. Our pervasive dairy advertising has led to one of the most commonly held, and
solidly disproved, fallacies about bones, which is that the best way to build strong bones
is to increase calcium consumption by drinking plenty of milk. Actually, the consensus
among leading medical researchers is that the best way for most people to increase their
calcium level and strengthen their bones is to reduce their protein intake, and
specifically to reduce consumption of animal products. Research has conclusively shown we
can do more to increase the calcium level in our bones by reducing protein intake than by
increasing calcium intake. The reason is that animal products and other sources of high
protein are very acidic, and the blood stream must balance this acidic condition by
absorbing alkaline minerals such as calcium from the bone structure. Thus, numerous
studies, including those published in the Aug. 22, 1984 Medical Tribune and the March 1983
Journal of Clinical Nutrition, have found that vegetarians have much stronger bones than
meat-eaters. Indeed, the Journal of Clinical Nutrition article found that by age 65,
meat-eaters had five to six times as much measurable bone loss as vegetarians.

Speaking of minerals, another serious problem caused by consumption of cow's milk
is iron-deficiency anemia. Dr. Oski notes that 15 to 20 percent of children under age 2 in
the U.S. suffer from iron-deficiency anemia. Cow's milk contributes to this condition in
two ways. First, he notes that cow's milk is extremely low in iron, containing less than 1
milligram of iron per quart. Because of this, he writes that it is estimated that a
1-year-old would need to drink 24 quarts of cow's milk a day to meet his iron
requirements, which would be impossible. He states many infants may drink from one to two
quarts of cow's milk a day, which satisfies their hunger to the point that they do no have
the appetite to consume enough of other foods that do have a high iron content. The second
way that cow's milk leads to iron-deficiency anemia in many infants is a form of
gastrointestinal bleeding caused by increased mucus and diarrhea associated with dairy
consumption. "It is estimated that half the iron-deficiency in infants in the United
States is primarily the result of this form of cow milk induced gastrointestinal
bleeding," Dr. Oski writes. "Mucus is frequent and some stools contain obvious
traces of bright red blood... The diarrhea impairs the infant's ability to retain
nutrients from his feedings. In addition, the changes produced in the gastrointestinal
tract by the allergic reaction result in seepage of the child's own blood into the gut.
This loss of plasma and red cells leads to a lowering of the infant's blood protein level
and to the development of anemia."

The mucus created by dairy products causes other problems as well. It is
well-known that dairy products cause excessive mucus in the lungs, sinuses and intestines.
Dr. Ellis notes this excess mucus in the breathing passages contributes to many
respiratory problems and that mucus hardens to form a coating on the inner wall of the
intestines that leads to poor absorption of nutrients, which can cause chronic fatigue.
This mucus also causes constipation, which can lead to many other problems. Two very
common problems with infants are colic and ear infections, both of which can be caused by
cow's milk. Medical studies have found cow's milk can contribute to these problems either
directly, when the infant drinks cow's milk, or indirectly, when the infant breast feeds
from a mother who has been consuming dairy products. Colic, suffered by one out of every
five infants in the U.S., is characterized by severe stomach cramps. The July/August 1994
issue of Natural Health reports, "When a mother eats dairy products, milk proteins
pass into her breast milk and end up in the baby's blood; some studies have found that
cow's milk proteins (from milk drunk by the mother) might trigger colick-like symptoms in
infants fed only human milk and no cow's milk." Concerning ear infections, Dr.
Northrup states, "You just don't see this painful condition among infants and
children who aren't getting cow's milk into their systems." The Natural Health
article also notes, "Removing dairy from the diet has been shown to shrink enlarged
tonsils and adenoids, indicating relief for the immune system. Similarly, doctors
experimenting with dairy-free diets often report a marked reduction in colds, flus,
sinusitis and ear infections."

Another common problem for children is the bellyache. Dr. Oski states in his book
that up to 10 percent of all children in this country suffer from a syndrome known as
"recurrent abdominal pain of childhood." He says studies performed in Boston and
San Francisco each concluded "that about one-third of such children had their
symptoms on the basis of lactose intolerance. The simple solution was to remove all milk
and milk-containing foods from the diet and watch for signs of improvement." The
Natural Health article also notes that antigens in cow's milk may contribute to arthritis
and osteoarthritis. "When antibody-antigen complexes (resulting from an immune
response) are deposited in the joints, pain, swelling, redness and stiffness result; these
complexes increase in arthritic people who eat dairy products, and the pain fades rapidly
after patients eliminate dairy products from their diets. In a study published in
Scandinavian Journal of Rheumatology, when people with rheumatoid arthritis fasted on
water, fruit and vegetable juices, and tea for seven to ten days, their joint pain and
stiffness were greatly reduced. When they ate a lacto-ovo-vegetarian diet (including only
milk and eggs as animal foods), the symptoms became aggravated and they remained
ill." A 1992 report in The New England Journal of Medicine also notes that cow's milk
can contribute to juvenile diabetes and autoimmune diseases by impairing the ability of
the pancreas to produce insulin. The Natural Health article also states a 1989 study
published in Nutrition and Cancer found a link between consumption of cow's milk and
butter with the risk of developing non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, a cancer of the immune system.
The article adds, "High levels of the cow's milk protein beta-lactoglobulin have also
been found in the blood of lung cancer patients, suggesting a link with this cancer as
well."

Dr. Oski's book also cites studies by two scientists from the University of
Michigan who have conducted extensive research on factors associated with multiple
sclerosis. There is an unusual geographic distribution of MS victims in the U.S. and
throughout the world, which has baffled medical researchers for decades. This distribution
of MS victims has no correlation to wealth, education or quality of medical care. Dr. Oski
notes the Michigan scientists found in this pattern in the U.S. and 21 other countries,
"the only significant link was between multiple sclerosis and average milk
consumption." Dr. Oski's book even cites a possible link between excessive
consumption of cow's milk and juvenile delinquency, based on a study conducted in Tacoma,
Wash. Dr. Oski writes, "When the diets of young criminals were contrasted with those
of adolescents from a similar background, it was found that the juvenile delinquents
consumed almost ten times the amount of milk that was drunk by the control group. The
juvenile offenders ate less fruit, nuts and vegetables."

When a reasonable person considers all this evidence, it would be difficult to
still believe cow's milk is healthy for human consumption. So, what do we drink instead?
Dr. Oski partly answers this question by writing, "For the newborn infant, there are
two obvious alternatives -- the right and left breast of the healthy mother." After a
child is weaned, there is no reason to drink any milk. We shouldn't drink any liquid with
our meals because this dilutes our digestive fluids. When we are thirsty, we should drink
distilled water. Or, if you want to drink something nutritional between meals, the best
choice is freshly-extracted vegetable juice.